If you liked the game "Wacky Wiffleball"that I posted a few weeks back or saw it recently on Youth Leader Stash. Here is version 2.0 with a wild messy new spin. This time around you ARE goint to use your wiffleball, just in a whole new fun way!!

Explanation:
Very simple rules and idea. You are going to be playing a wacky game of
wiffleball/baseball with a wiffleball filled with a variety of baby food inside. Before the pitch the you will squeeze in a good amount of baby food into the ball. Every time the ball is hit, of course, baby food is going to go spinning out of the holes causing a mess! It is similar to the old "shaving cream baseball", doing the same thing filling the ball with shaving cream!

You can just play a regular game of wiffleball/baseball or use the rules similar rules to other Wacky Wiffleball game...

"You can throw the and hit someone to get them out. Two addition to the rules that
we add is: 1.) you can have as many people on a base at a time as you
like, but only one person can run to the next base at a time. It keeps
it from being one massive herd of people running at a time. 2.) There
are no strike outs. Determine for your group and game where and what is
a home run, if you would like.

As always like any good backyard or youth group version of wiffeball
make up whatever "house rules" you like for your group to add to the
fun. Change things each time your play or each inning. Like: "this
inning you have to run the base in reverse", "you have to skip around
the bases", etc...

Enjoy have fun and let your imagination run with other great squeezable products that you can fill your wiffleball with... maybe EZ cheese"?? Would love to hear what you end up using!!

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Five people may have died over the past three years after drinking
Monster Energy, a popular energy drink that is high in caffeine,
according to incident reports recently released by the Food and Drug Administration.

The reports, like similar filings with the F.D.A. in cases involving
drugs or medical devices, do not prove a link between Monster Energy and
the deaths or other health problems. The records were recently obtained
under the Freedom of Information Act by the mother of a 14-year-old
Maryland girl who died in December from a heart arrhythmia after
drinking large cans of Monster Energy on two consecutive days.

Last week, Wendy Crossland, the mother of that teenager, filed a lawsuit
against Monster Beverage, a publicly traded company in Corona, Calif.,
that used to be known as Hansen Natural.
The lawsuit charges that Monster failed to warn about the risks of its
energy drinks; a spokeswoman for the company said last week that its
products were safe and not the cause of the teenager’s death.

That spokeswoman, Judy Lin Sfetcu, added that Monster was “unaware of
any fatality anywhere that has been caused by its drinks.”

Monster Beverage’s stock ended down Monday more than 14 percent, sliding
sharply after The New York Times reported about the F.D.A. filings.

In an interview, an F.D.A. spokeswoman, Shelly Burgess, said the agency
had received reports of five deaths with possible links to the drink as
well as a report of a nonfatal heart attack. Additional incident reports
referred to other adverse events such as abdominal pain, vomiting,
tremors and abnormal heart rate. The reports disclosed cover a period of
2004 to June of this year, but all the deaths occurred in 2009 or
later.

The filings do not make clear whether the incidents involved other
factors, like alcohol or drugs. However, the number of reports that the
F.D.A. receives about any product it regulates usually understates by a
large degree the actual number of problems.

The release of the filings about Monster Energy may increase
Congressional calls for greater regulation of the energy products
industry. Monster Energy is among scores of energy drinks like Red Bull
and Rock Star, and energy “shots” like 5-hour Energy, that companies are
aggressively marketing to teenagers and young people.

In a statement, Ms. Burgess, the F.D.A. spokeswoman, said that it was
the responsibility of energy drink manufacturers to investigate
accusations of death or injuries associated with them. She said that the
agency was still looking into the cases but had yet to establish a
causal link between the deaths and the drink.

But the release of the F.D.A. reports may also raise questions about how
closely producers of energy products monitor their safety or whether
the F.D.A. reviews those activities.

Late Monday, Ms. Sfetcu, the Monster Beverage spokesman, said that the
company had not received copies of the F.D.A. incident filings about
possible fatalities associated with its products apart from the one
filed in connection with the December death of the Maryland teenager,
Anais Fournier. She said she did not know whether the company actively
monitored the F.D.A. database that collects reports about such
incidents.

Monster Beverage makes a variety of energy drinks with names like
Monster Rehab, Monster Assault and Monster Heavy Metal. Labels on the
containers state that they are “not recommended” for some consumers,
including children — a group that beverage producers define as those
under 12 years — and people “sensitive” to caffeine.

Under current F.D.A. rules, companies are not required to disclose
caffeine levels in their beverages and can choose to market them as
drinks or as dietary supplements. Those regulatory categories have
differing labeling and ingredient rules.

While healthy adults can safely consume large quantities of caffeine
from sources like coffee, tea and energy drinks, the drug, which acts as
a stimulant, can pose risks to those with underlying conditions like
heart disorders.

The type of 24-ounce can of Monster Energy that the Maryland teenager,
Anais Fournier, drank contains 240 milligrams of caffeine.

The lawsuit filed last week on behalf of the teenager referred to
autopsy and medical examiner reports that said she had died of “cardiac
arrhythmia due to caffeine toxicity” that had exacerbated an existing
heart problem. The report also showed that the teenager had
Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which can affect the body’s connective tissue,
including blood vessels. A lawyer for her family, Kevin Goldberg, said
that the 14-year-old had been aware she had an underlying heart
condition but added that her doctors had not told her to restrict her
physical activities or her caffeine use.

In an April letter citing the teenager’s death, Senator Richard J.
Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, urged the F.D.A. to enforce caffeine
levels in energy drinks.

In August, F.D.A. officials responded by saying that there was
insufficient evidence to take action on caffeine levels in energy
drinks. However, the agency also noted then that it had not yet received
medical reports related to the Maryland teenager’s death.

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Family dinner together may just be the new most important meal of the day and may be the life of your MS/JH Students. 18 year long study on the connect between family dinner and life long drug use!

" Over the past 18 years, The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASAColumbiaTM) has surveyed thousands of American teens and their parents to identify situations and circumstances that influence the risk of teen substance abuse. Why? Because a child who gets through age 21 without using illegal drugs, abusing alcohol or smoking is virtually certain never to do so. What we’ve learned is that parents have the greatest influence on whether their teens will choose not to use.

Our past surveys have consistently found a relationship between children having frequent dinners with their parents and a decreased risk of their using drugs, drinking or smoking, and that parental engagement fostered around the dinner table is one of the most potent tools to help parents raise healthy, drug-free children.